Category: Federal Agencies

The New Year has begun, and after saying goodbye to 2016, taxpayers are ready to welcome 2017. While many people resolve to shed a few pounds and break some bad habits, this year’s list of resolutions highlights all of the major issues that the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) will focus on throughout the year.

Congress

The resolution for Congress in 2017 is clear: No More Excuses. Washington (including the incoming Trump administration) have no more excuses for not getting things done for taxpayers. On a wide range of issues, including tax reform and regulatory reform, members of the House and Senate can longer make excuses for not doing the necessary work to fix some of the major problems impacting taxpayers. It is time for Congress to get to work. For more on Congress, click here.

As people celebrate the holidays in different ways across the country, the Taxpayers Protection Alliance is celebrating Festivus. The holiday created by the television show “Seinfeld” challenges all the normal rules of gift giving and decorations and is essentially a day of telling people why you’re upset with them about the choices they’ve made over the last year.

Airing of Grievances

The first tradition of Festivus is “the airing of grievances.” This part of Festivus expresses the ways that taxpayers have been disappointed over the last year. While there could have been an entire book written on taxpayer grievances, here are just a few grievances that taxpayers have with bureaucrats and lawmakers.

Finally, a government report that doesn’t fully embrace the notion of taxpayer-financed municipal broadband services. The Tennessee Advisory Group on Intergovernmental Relations (TACIR) recently posted a draft study (the final study is expected to be released some time early in 2017) on broadband access and investment on its website. The report outlines several municipal broadband failures and, while it does suggest that electrical cooperatives work with cities to provide broadband service directly to consumers, it strongly urges municipal leaders not to create their own taxpayer-financed networks.